


i'm gonna be here (until i'm nothing);

by unintentionallyangsty



Series: drive the dark things away; [16]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies), Thor: Ragnarok (2017) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Brodinsons, Brother Feels, Brotherly Affection, Brotherly Angst, Brotherly Love, Brothers, Comfort/Angst, Dysfunctional Family, Gen, Hurt Thor (Marvel), Hurt/Comfort, Illnesses, Infection, Loki Lives (Marvel), Loki is a Good Bro (Marvel), Nightmares, Post-Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Protective Loki (Marvel), The Revengers - Freeform, The Statesman, Whump, Whumptober, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-23
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 07:07:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27159773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unintentionallyangsty/pseuds/unintentionallyangsty
Summary: Nearly a fortnight into the voyage on theStatesman, Loki notices that something is off about Thor.Determined to get to the bottom of things, Loki begins to pay a bit more attention to his brother.As it turns out, he isn't happy with what he discovers.(Whumptober 2020 Prompt #21 Fill: Infection).
Relationships: Brunnhilde | Valkyrie & Loki (Marvel), Loki & Thor, Loki & Thor (Marvel)
Series: drive the dark things away; [16]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1949623
Comments: 18
Kudos: 146
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	i'm gonna be here (until i'm nothing);

**Author's Note:**

> Loki & Thor. the _Statesman_.
> 
> written for the Whumptober 2020 Prompt #21 Fill: Infection. 
> 
> **chapter warnings !** : some mentions of illness and vomit.

“Loki!” 

Loki started where he was laid out, still awake on his thin bedroll, his shoulders tensing as his hand almost automatically shot out to summon a weapon, only to falter as he inhaled sharply and forced himself to remain still, in order to listen for any sounds that might have followed Thor’s sudden cry. 

And, after a beat of silence, Loki willed himself to relax slightly, though he did not quite fall back to his previous relaxed position. 

“Thor?” he whispered, shooting a quick look over to the corner of the chambers the Valkyrie and Bruce shared and, when nothing stirred in the darkness, sat up onto his elbows to hiss again, “ _Thor!_ ” 

“What?” Thor snapped back, a bit more irritably than Loki had expected, his voice sounding somewhat thin and strained, though Loki could not make out his features to confirm. 

“What?” Loki parroted, swallowing past the bit of apprehension he could feel fluttering at the back of his throat and forcing a bit of irritation into his own tone. “What _you_ , not what _me_. What do you want?” 

“What do _I_ want?” Thor repeated, a bit of the tremor behind his voice making way for exasperation. 

( _Good_. Loki thought, somewhat savagely).

(Frustration, he could deal with). 

“You’re the one starting a conversation in the middle of the night.” Thor griped.

“I--” Loki hotly began, only to falter slightly when Thor’s words caught up with him fully. 

“What?” he repeated for what truly felt like the millionth time in the past five minutes. “ _You’re_ the one who said _my_ name.” he snapped, finally. 

Thor, it seemed, was just as bewildered as he, and after another beat of silence the sound of him shifting to sit up as well sounded from the other end of the room. 

“I did?” 

The call was almost imperceptible, far quieter than Thor was usually capable of keeping himself.

Loki would have even called it hesitant, were it not for the fact that he knew Thor to be nearly incapable of such a state of being. 

“You--you did.” Loki replied, at length, and found that he had to swallow past another surge of nervousness at the words. 

Had he been awoken by the call, Loki might have more easily dismissed it as a lingering fragment of an already forgotten dream, or an auditory hallucination flickering at the edge of his consciousness. 

It certainly wouldn’t have been the first time. 

As it was, he had been entirely awake, still finding sleep a little hard to come by even almost a full fortnight into their voyage upon the _Statesman_. 

Therefore, the reality left but one alternative. 

Thor had called out audibly, and had no memory of doing so. 

The idea, not to mention the implications behind it, made Loki almost wish it had been his own fraying grip on reality playing tricks on him. 

“Oh.” Thor replied, at last, his tone hollow and devoid of any identifiable emotion. “I--I apologize.” 

“Don’t.” Loki dismissed immediately, and raised a hand to wave the comment off, before he realized Thor could not see the gesture, and dropped the limb back into his lap a little lamely. “Just--” 

_Just what?_ His mind taunted. What could he offer that wouldn’t seem at all cheap or patronizing? 

Or, more likely, outrightly mocking? 

It was clear that something had awoken Thor following his cry, and Loki was more than familiar with his own fair share of nightmares to mistake the behavior for anything else. 

How to react accordingly, however? That was a different beast, entirely. 

Thor would have hovered, he considered. Would have pressed him for answers and fought to identify a physical outcome he could beat back, in order to ensure Loki’s safety and comfort. 

(It was how he had reacted to Loki’s nightmares in the past, at any rate, and Loki did not particularly want to dwell too long on the question of whether or not Thor might even be bothered to extend the same amount of care and attention, now). 

As it was, Loki did not feel as if his standing and crossing the room to hover over Thor’s bed like a fussing nursemaid would be particularly well received. 

He opened his mouth to offer something, though as to what he remained entirely unsure--

Comfort? Acceptance? A blatant dismissal? 

Somehow, no option seemed quite appropriate. 

Before he got the chance, however, Thor huffed a tired breath, and Loki could just make out the image of him swinging his feet over the edge of the bed through the dark of the room. 

“What are you doing?” Loki burst out, slightly perplexed at the development. 

“It’s not long before morning.” Thor informed, before turning to squint at the shielded window on the wall opposite Loki. “I think.” 

Loki blinked slightly, honestly taken aback at the info. 

It was true that they could never truly tell what time of day it was on the ship, though they had scheduled the ship’s lights into something like a hollow mockery of an average Asgardian day when their voyage had begun. 

This fact aside, Loki didn’t at all feel as if he’d been lying awake more than half the scheduled sleeping period.

Though, he considered, stranger things had been known to happen. 

“Oh.” he parroted, a little weakly, and watched with a small frown as Thor stood and crossed the room. 

“Go back to sleep.” Thor commanded, and paused by Loki’s bedroll to shoot him a small, almost gentle smile. 

Suddenly uncomfortable at the attention, Loki glanced away and cleared his throat pointedly. 

“I could say the same for you.” he muttered, after a moment. 

“I’m just going for a walk.” Thor replied, and Loki did not have to look to see him shrug with forced nonchalance. “I’ll be back.” 

The words were spoken casually, though it was clear that Thor did not anticipate any argument. 

Loki offered his own shrug, though he kept his gaze firmly on where his hands had begun to twist together in his lap, even as he heard the door to the chambers slide quietly open. 

“I’ll be back.” Thor repeated, followed by the sound of the door sliding softly shut behind his exit. 

“Alright.” Loki muttered dully to the now almost painfully silent room, and swallowed thickly as he continued to fiddle with the soft fabric of his sleeves at the wrists. 

He remained in a similar position, his brow furrowed in thought, the remaining hour until the ship’s lights flickered to life above them. 

And, even then, Thor did not return. 

\---

Thor was flagging. 

It wasn’t overtly obvious, at first, though Loki was clued into the fact not three days following the nightmare. 

Thor had seemed weary the day following, though this was little surprise. Loki, more often than not, found himself exhausted after a night disrupted by a nightmare. It would stand to reason that Thor was no different, though the stark difference was that Thor’s exhaustion was far more identifiable, given that Loki tended to cast a glamour to cover his own. 

Therefore, the tired rings around Thor’s eyes were to be expected, as was the way he began to lean heavily onto the table, halfway through the council meeting that afternoon. 

What was particularly concerning, however, was the fact that the weariness only seemed to have increased, the day following that. 

Admittedly, Loki had spent the evening before drifting in and out of an uneasy sleep, on alert for any sound that might have indicated Thor’s sleep being disrupted. 

What was left of Asgard needed their king well rested and alert, after all.

To his surprise (and admitted relief) Thor had seemingly slept the entire night through, and had remained asleep even after the lights had come on, and Banner and the Valkyrie had filed out of the room. 

Loki had lingered behind, torn between prodding Thor awake (they each had a lengthy to-do list before them, after all, Thor’s undoubtedly the longest) and allowing him another few hours of sleep. 

He had, after all, spent the better part of the past two weeks running himself ragged. A little respite was probably deserved, if not necessary. 

In the end, this train of thought had won out, and Loki had left the room to begin tackling his own agenda for the day, leaving Thor to rest for as long as he deemed necessary. 

Therefore, it was something of a surprise when, near lunch time, Loki spotted Thor at the far end of the throne room, the bags beneath his eye and eyepatch stark and noticeably darker, even from where Loki was standing. 

It was then that Loki had determined to begin paying more attention to his brother’s behavior, if only to ensure the wellbeing of Asgard’s king. 

And, as it turned out, he did not like what he discovered. 

Thor grew increasingly, obviously exhausted, over the course of the few days following the nightmare. His eye became sunken, and the normally rosy pallor of his cheeks beneath his beard had drained to something almost waxen. 

He had grown quieter, as well. 

Loki had quickly grown accustomed to hearing his brother laughing or chattering at almost all times of the day, when they were inhabiting the same space. When he was not chatting with any of his companions, Thor could easily be found checking in with as many of his citizens as he could cram into one day, smiling and nodding along when appropriate, as if actually listening and registering what he was being told. 

He was a good king, Loki had noted less than a day into their unanticipated trip through the cosmos. For all his griping and attempts to avoid the burden of the throne, it was as if Thor was made for the job. 

And, Loki had considered with little humor, he supposed that he was. 

Which was why it was particularly unnerving to see him waver so obviously, Loki thought, as he watched his brother pick at the bowl of rations before him where he was sat at the other end of the dining hall. 

Over the past three days, he had watched Thor shrivel from a normally jovial and boisterous king, into this small and subdued shell of himself.

And it seemed that he was not the only one. 

“What’s up with Golden Boy?” the Valkyrie settled herself into the set beside Loki, and dropped her own tray of rations onto the otherwise empty table before them with a clatter. 

Loki did not bother to hide his scowl. 

“I don’t know if you’re aware.” he drawled, “But normally, when one sits at one of the only unoccupied tables in a room, they would like to keep it that way.” 

“Whatever.” the Valkyrie replied, and began to chew obnoxiously at the end of one of the carrots from her plate. “So.” 

“So?” Loki snapped, and rolled his eyes when the Valkyrie turned to pull a flask from her belt at her hip. 

“ _So_.” she mocked, and nodded toward the other end of the hall as she took a long sip. 

“What’s up with him?” she tacked on as she drew the flask from her mouth.

Loki blinked, and followed the Valkyrie’s gaze to where Thor was still sat, his head propped up against his fist even as he nodded along to whatever one of the individuals at his table was saying. 

“Thor?” he inquired, and turned to shoot the Valkyrie a puzzled expression. “What about him?”

In reply, the Valkyrie snorted disbelievingly before taking another short sip from her flask. 

“You know, for the famed ‘God of Lies’,” she quipped, “That wasn’t a great attempt.” 

Loki felt the frown on his face deepen. “What do you want me to say?” he grit out, turning away and, finding that he had no meal of his own to poke at as a distraction (he hadn’t felt particularly hungry that afternoon), began to pick lazily at his fingernails. 

“Thor can handle his own problems.” he added on a murmur. 

“So you’d agree that there’s a problem?” the Valkyrie inquired, and only offered a pleased smirk when Loki turned to offer her another scowl. 

“There’s no shortage of problems, when it comes to Thor.” he snapped, and nodded curtly before beginning to rise to his feet. 

“Hey!” the Valkyrie cried and, before Loki could react, shot out a hand to grip at his wrist. 

With a low growl, Loki yanked his arm from the hold, only to be met with the Valkyrie’s surprisingly sincere expression for his trouble. 

“There’s something wrong with him.” she informed with uncharacteristic solemnity. “And I know you know it.” 

“Then I will rephrase my question.” Loki sneered, and allowed himself to take a small step back and away from her shrewd gaze. “What would you propose that I do about it?” 

To his surprise, the Valkyrie seemed to falter, and her gaze flickered briefly back to where Thor was sat before she offered an indifferent shrug. 

“I don’t know.” she admitted, already raising the flask in her hand back to her mouth. “But he cares about you. Norns know why.” she added with a small sniff. 

“Charmed.” Loki drawled. 

“Just talk to him.” The Valkyrie snapped with a roll of her eyes. “It’d probably be taken better from you than anyone else.” 

As irritated as the admission was, there was an undeniable glimmer of truth beneath it, and Loki felt something within himself stutter slightly at the words. 

“I--” he faltered, and hunched his shoulders a bit before nodding with a bit more genuity. “I’ll keep it in mind.” 

Before the Valkyrie could reply, he turned on his heel and strode toward the exit of the dining hall. 

It was only as he was turning the corner out of the hall entirely that Loki realized that he felt not only one, but two gazes following him as he did. 

\---

“Loki!” 

Loki jerked back into wakefulness with a scowl, and opened his mouth to tell Thor off for interrupting the otherwise pleasant silence of the evening for the second time in one week (because really, this was getting a bit ridiculous), only for the words to die on his lips when he sat up and turned toward the bed at the corner of the room--

Only to find it empty. 

Ah. So an actual auditory hallucination this time, then. Typical. 

With a huff, Loki collapsed onto his back to study the ceiling above through narrowed eyes, and fought to control the breaths suddenly leaving him in short and rattling pants. 

If there had been a dream leading up to this point, he could not remember it. Though, as it turned out, the fact did little to soothe the rapid thrumming of his pulse. 

It was only when he managed to suck in a full and steady inhale past the stickiness he could feel lodged between his lungs, that Loki entirely registered the fact that Thor’s bed was vacant. 

With a start, he sat back up onto his elbows and turned back to the bed, his heart beginning to hammer again as he reconfirmed to himself that it was, in fact, empty.

Despite his actually having been able to fall into something of a fitful sleep that evening, for once, Loki was certain that it was not currently even halfway through the scheduled sleeping period. 

Which meant that, somewhere between Thor’s falling wearily into bed just after the rest of them and now, his brother had stirred and wandered out into the halls of the ship. 

Normally, Loki considered, he would not allow himself to be concerned. 

Thor was an adult, after all. If he wanted to take a stroll through the vast halls of the _Statesman_ at Norns knew what hour, Loki was certainly not going to stop him. 

Now, however? Now… 

The Valkyrie’s words from earlier that afternoon rose to the forefront of his mind, unbidden, and Loki found himself staggering to his feet before he had fully registered the urge to do so. 

_There’s something wrong with him…_

With a huff, Loki summoned his leather overcoat to throw over his thin sleep clothes, and allowed himself a huff of irritation before he hastened out of the room.

It was only as he was halfway down the hall just outside the room, his eyes squinting to make sense of the darkness of the hall, that Loki realized that he had absolutely no idea as to where to begin his search for his wayward brother. 

Not that he was entirely out of options. 

With a small sigh, Loki shifted so that he was pressed against the wall to his right, took a long, steady inhale, and allowed his eyes to slide shut as he sent out a few calculated tendrils of his seiðr to scan the ship. 

Almost immediately, his energy snagged on a tendril of Thor’s, and he nearly startled back with the force of it. 

His eyes snapped open not a second later, and he automatically swallowed against the dread he could feel pooling within his stomach. 

Loki did not tend to dabble in the art of invading upon the thoughts of others, unless he was truly out of options, but… 

The fact that Thor was distressed was, now, entirely undeniable.

With a gust of an exhale, Loki pushed himself off of the wall, and immediately turned to follow the almost palpable wisp of energy still strung out between himself and wherever Thor was. 

As it turned out, he did not have to search for long. 

Despite Asgard’s numbers still being vast, the people who had survived Ragnarok tended to stick together, leaving a number of rooms at the very edges of the ship currently unoccupied. 

One of these rooms was where Loki inevitably found Thor, not half an hour later, hunched in the refresher at the corner of the room and retching miserably into the toilet. 

“Thor, you _oaf_.” Loki whispered to himself, and shook his head once before surging forward, as if tugged by a string wrapped and tied firmly around one of his ribs. 

“Thor,” he murmured as he all but fell to his knees beside Thor’s hunched figure, his hands already beginning to shake (to his chagrin) as he extended them to hover uncertainly, halfway between himself and his brother. “ _Thor_.” 

At the slightly louder call, Thor’s shoulders tensed, and he exhaled another weak retch before turning to face Loki, his mouth open and his remaining eye streaming as he panted for breath. 

“L--Loki.” he gasped, before something like horror dawned on his features.

Immediately, he shifted, and began to straighten--

Only to fall forward again with a groan. 

“Stop, you oaf.” Loki chided, and finally found it within himself to move forward to press a hand to Thor’s shoulder, if only to keep him where he was, all but collapsed against the seat of the toilet. 

Immediately, Loki felt the unnatural heat of Thor’s skin seep into the skin of his palm, and felt the irritation within his chest bubble further toward the surface. “You absolute _idiot!_ ” 

“That’s--” Thor huffed a small, flickering smile. “That’s very kind of you.” 

Loki scowled. 

“How could you do this?” he snapped, and jerked both hands back to himself in order to begin worrying them together in his lap, the thumbnail of his left hand scratching irritably at the palm of his right. “Work yourself up to this state?”

“How could…” Thor trailed off, and successfully pulled himself far enough away from the toilet to shake his head and shoot Loki a mildly exasperated look. “You think that this was intentional?” 

“I don’t know what to think.” Loki hissed, well past the point of knowing that he was making little sense now, yet entirely uncaring, all the same. “I never know what to think with you.” 

“Ha!” Thor barked a weak, vaguely bitter laugh, and glanced briefly away. “That’s something, coming from you.” 

“Don’t change the subject!” Loki cried, and found, suddenly, that he had to swallow past a sudden thickness cloying at the back of his throat. 

A sensation that was not at all helped by the way Thor wavered dangerously in place, his gaze going glassy and a little distant. 

“Thor,” Loki attempted, and felt his heart begin to hammer within his chest when Thor did not respond. “ _Thor!_ ” 

Loki extended a hand to snap his fingers sharply, inches away from Thor’s nose, and only then did Thor jerk back into something like vague coherence. 

“What?” he snapped, and raised a hand to swat Loki’s own away from his face. 

“Pay attention.” Loki griped distractedly, and felt his pulse beginning to speed as he cast his gaze about the small space and realized, distantly, that he did not at all know where to go from here. 

“Can you stand?” he inquired, after a moment, and was not at all encouraged by the way Thor groaned slightly in response. 

“I--” Thor faltered, before he fell forward to bury his face behind both his hands with another groan. 

Loki felt his stomach turn slightly at the sight. 

“ _Thor_.” 

“It’s fine.” Thor murmured, his voice slightly muffled, before he straightened again with a small sigh, and turned to shoot Loki a small smile. “It’s alright, Loki.” 

Loki felt something deep within him curdle at the words. 

“No.” he muttered, and forced himself to ignore Thor’s slightly wounded expression in order to continue, “No, Thor. You don’t get to--to just...dismiss this.” 

Thor frowned slightly. “Loki--” 

“No!” Loki surged upward on his knees, and jut his chin out even as he wavered. “No, Thor! Not this time.” 

The silence that followed his outburst echoed unnervingly between them, and Loki found himself fighting the urge to simply stand and bolt out of the room entirely. 

He thought briefly of the _Commodore_ , still latched to the top of the _Statesman_. There...there was an out. 

And yet…

And yet, even as he thought it, Loki found that he did not want one. 

(At least not at the current moment). 

“ _Thor_ ,” he whispered, and grit his teeth past the quivering of his jaw as he fell back onto his haunches. 

“What--” Loki paused, and took a moment to inhale a tremulous breath, before he glanced uncomfortably away. 

“What can I do?” 

There was a beat, before Thor inhaled a sharp breath, the sound undeniably surprised.

“Loki,” he began, slowly.

“I’m--I’m not sure that there’s anything you can do.” he admitted, after another beat. 

Loki sucked in a sharp breath at the words, though he shook his head not a moment later and turned to face Thor, again.

“You’re unwell.” he informed, probably unnecessarily, and frowned severely when Thor began to shake his head.

“It’s nothing you need to concern yourself with.” Thor dismissed, hastily. “It--” 

“ _Stop_.” Loki commanded. 

And, to his mild surprise, Thor did, his eye wide even as his mouth snapped obediently shut. 

_Better_ , Loki considered humorlessly. 

Without fully considering what he was about to do, Loki extended his hand again, and allowed it to hover between them just another moment longer before it fell to Thor’s shoulder, his fingers just barely brushing the tendons of his neck. 

Almost immediately, Loki hissed, and fought the urge to jerk backward and away from the touch. 

“It’s infected.” he growled, and offered a sneer in the face of Thor’s startled expression. “You absolute _idiot_.” 

“How was I supposed to know?” Thor countered, a bit weakly, and raised one hand to prod at the now obviously puffy skin around his eyepatch. 

How Loki hadn’t noticed it before now was, in all honesty, a mystery. 

“It didn’t start hurting until yesterday.” Thor continued to grumble, and prodded at the wound again.

“Stop.” Loki repeated, and released his grip on Thor’s shoulder to bat the hand away from the wound. 

Thor looked slightly perplexed, though he complied, and lowered his hand to rest in his lap even as he continued to eye Loki warily. 

“You can go back to bed.” he informed, after a moment, his brow slightly furrowed as he tracked the movement of Loki’s hand as it travelled up toward his right temple. “Really--”

“Shut up, Thor.” Loki muttered, and allowed himself a moment to hesitate further, before the very tips of his fingers ghosted along the skin of Thor’s temple around his eyepatch. 

He allowed a tendril of seiðr to extend, then, and felt his eyes narrow in concentration as his magic worked to draw the infection out of the wound behind Thor’s eyepatch in slow, steady pulses. 

“You should have told someone.” Loki murmured, after the last, bitter dregs of illness had been drawn from the wound. 

He allowed his hand to fall back, then, and turned away to study the wall just beyond Thor’s shoulder. “A healer, at least.” he tacked on with a small, disapproving scowl. 

There was a beat, before Thor’s large hand landed heavily on Loki’s own shoulder. 

“Perhaps.” Thor replied noncommittally. 

Which, Loki assumed, was the closest thing to agreement he was ever going to receive, on this matter. 

“I thank you, brother.” Thor continued, when Loki could not find it within himself to do more than open his mouth soundlessly (uselessly) in reply. 

“It--” Loki huffed, and raised a hand to brush the hand irritably off of his shoulder--

Only to pause, his fingertips just barely grazing Thor’s warm knuckles. 

“It’s nothing.” he muttered, and cleared his throat, keeping his gaze carefully averted even as his hand fell to lie lightly atop Thor’s own. 

If just for a moment. 

“It’s fine.” 

**Author's Note:**

> loki is awkward and bad at comfort and i love him for it !!
> 
> (also y'all requested this and now i'm addicted to the idea of protective loki, so thanks)
> 
> hmu at my tumblr [here!](http://littlekinng.tumblr.com) xx 


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